"Better Than Gold" was the title of the lead article in the March, 1910, issue of OutWest magazine. The value of oil production in the Golden State in 1910 was twice that of gold. The cover picture is the iconic picture of oil production in those days, an uncontrolled "gusher" with a lake of oil on the ground.

“Better Than Gold” was the title of the lead article in the March, 1910, issue of OutWest Magazine. The value of oil production in the Golden State in 1910 was twice that of gold. The cover picture is the iconic picture of oil production in those days, an uncontrolled “gusher” with a lake of oil on the ground.

The article says that there was little prospect of supply exceeding demand. “Japan is said to be in the market for ten million barrels at the present time. The Western Pacific Railroad has just closed a contract for three thousand barrels a day.” The Salt Lake Line, the Santa Fé, and the Southern Pacific were all increasing their use.

The U. S. Navy was buying oil and ”there is a good prospect of oil taking the place of coal in propelling our battleships.”

Pasadena was not geologically capable of producing oil, the nearest field being in downtown Los Angeles, discovered by E. L. Doheny in 1892.

But Pasadenan Professor T. S. C. Lowe of Mt. Lowe Railroad fame came into the picture. Lowe held many patents for making gas from oil. A variation on his gas making process was to further cook the waste tars and lampblack into a coke-like state called “carbonite.” One observer said, “the carbonite industry is an infant but oil carbonite has no superior for the manufacture of electric carbons [for arc lights], as an abrasive, or as a high-grade fuel.” Carbonite was expected to replace coke in the refining of iron ore.

The article recounted the history of oil production in California. It described the tremendous profits being made and seemed to be pushing oil stocks.

“A few years ago the Union Oil Company of California was organized. It the owned some unimportant properties in Ventura County. Ten years ago, a controlling interest in the company sold for $300,000. Today the company has assets valued at $100,000,000.”

“Monte Cristo, Peerless, Caribou and McKittrick and many, many others have made the original stockholders enormous profits. In fact,large portions of the oil stocks listed on the California Oil Exchange are paying dividends steadily. While the profits of the past have been very large, those of the future will be even greater.”